"I actually tried to convince some other art dealers to move with me to an old Nabisco factory in Brisbane," said Catherine Clark, who feared a fivefold increase in her gallery rent at 49 Geary St. "They all thought I was crazy, though a few of them indulged me by discussing it."

After 12 years at 250 Sutter St., Graystone Gallery proprietor Ed Russell's rent would have more than doubled in April to $5 per square foot.

He looked at a vacant space in the 49 Geary St. building, where various other galleries already cluster.

"But the owner would only negotiate for one year with no considerations," such as a tenant's improvement allowance or an option to renew, Russell said. "They were unbending."

But just a few doors away at 77 Geary, which also houses several art dealers, the owners were ready to deal.

When he explained the pressure he was under to move, Russell said, "I even got a temporary space for five months for free" at 77 Geary.

Catherine Clark panicked last fall when, contemplating renewal of her lease at 49 Geary after almost seven years, she heard talk of a 600 percent rate increase. She has been paying $1 per square foot monthly.

Then rental rates at 49 Geary began to slide.

"Around the first of the year, we were quoting lease rates as high as $60 per foot per year," said Barbara Axelson of Cushman & Wakefield, the leasing agent for 49 Geary. "Now they're down around $33," which corresponds in monthly rates to a decline from $5 to $2.85 per foot.

As to the future, Axelson said, "the market has been fluctuating so much that it's hard to tell what will happen."

"I spent more than six months trying to find something I could afford," Clark said.

In the gallery business location matters almost as much as affordability.

Clark considered signing a lease, as did Ed Russell and Patricia Sweetow, in a building being redeveloped at 1019 Market St.

AN EXCITING PROSPECT

"I even signed a letter of intent and decided I'd forge a new path," Clark said. "I was both excited and intimidated by the prospect." But 1019 Market lies between Sixth and Seventh streets, in a block with a distinctly Tenderloin flavor unsavory to most gallery clientele.

"They were talking about $5 a square foot, now they're talking more like $2. 60," Clark said. "It's still more than I can afford, but I'm hoping I can stay.

At this point I haven't fully committed to either possibility."

Cheryl Haines, whose Haines Gallery has been on the top floor at 49 Geary for almost 10 years, has been telling other dealers in the building "to stay put no matter what it takes."

"I think the situation at 49 Geary is unique and impossible to duplicate," Haines said. "This building has added tremendously to the validity of the art scene in San Francisco. Not only have galleries added value to the building, it's become a destination in its own right. We get visitors from all over the world coming through here."

Two other dealers found a bargain South of Market in 1999, before the rental crunch turned critical for most of their colleagues.

Ruth Braunstein, facing displacement from 250 Sutter St., and Tod Hosfelt, who saw rent suddenly double on his old space near South Park, leased in tandem 10,000 square feet in a warehouse on Clementina Alley then owned by Bill Graham Productions.

DISAPPEARING LIKE DINOSAURS

Because the adjacent Braunstein/Quay Gallery and Hosfelt Gallery spaces had been vacant for a year and a half when the two dealers came along, they were able to negotiate a 10-year lease at a rate Hosfelt said was "well below market rate, even then."

"It's ironic that the galleries are the ones surviving," said Patricia Sweetow, another 49 Geary gallery owner, "while the dot-coms, which had billions behind them, disappear like the dinosaurs."

But while the rental picture has brightened lately, new clouds shadow the San Francisco gallery scene.

Sweetow pointed out that galleries in big buildings like 49 Geary will have to absorb the steep electricity rate increases soon to hit the properties' owners, who qualify as major utility customers.

"When rent becomes affordable," Clark said, "that means gallery business is down. The galleries are the last to benefit in good economic times and the first to suffer in bad times."